Halloween 2013

It was another successful Halloween.



After two or three years of being a puppy, Anna Rose this year was a cat. Lia and I crashed her Halloween party at school and turns out several of her friends were cats, too. Hmmm coincidence? I think not.



As for Dave Dave, by the end of October 31, he had donned not one, not two, but three dinosaur costumes





- none of which we had purchased for this particular holiday. Go figure. His greatest accomplishment by far was his first successful pumpkin carving (with parental help). He went for scary and I think he got it.



Dave Dave, you put the pump in pumpkin. That's all I gots to say.



Lia put on a gray wig and my old duck tape man costume. She scared the poo out of me when I walked in on her getting ready. I guess you could say I was unprepared.



I was a cowboy. My friend Hannaha wrote "Andy" on my sole. Alls I gots to say about that is that it really felt like a snake was in my boot. As good as these cowboy boots look, they sure don't wear so well. By evening's end I was really walking like a cowboy.

The experience taught me the importance of figuring in good footwear to every costume ensemble.

Happy Halloween everyone!

Thanks Trevor

I was searching images, looking for inspiration for the cover of Clay, and stumbled upon it. This photo over the Georgia night sky was taken this year by Trevor Mork. I showed it to Robert Milam who is doing the cover for me, and he loved it, too. Then came the tracking the photographer down. A few emails and a bit of Facebook stalking later, Trevor agreed to let me use it. Thanks Trevor. What a talent.

Robert is still working on the touch up and text layout…so far it's inspiring!

Stay tuned.

Feeling My Age

I have been feeling like an old man lately. I guess it's inevitable. I'm growing old. I used to think thirty-nine was really old. Lately, I've been feeling like it is.

There was Windy Gap. I'll tell you, "sleeping" in a cabin with fifteen junior and senior high schoolers for a weekend will make you feel old. I think I might have mentioned it out loud a few times because my friend Jay, a senior, gave me a pep talk while we rocked in chairs out under the stars into the wee hours Saturday night. Thanks Jay. I needed that.



Actually, the old feeling happened earlier this summer. I injured my achilles tendon trying to run faster than I should have. Injuries happen. They happen to anyone. Of any age. But then I read the Mayo Clinic description…

Achilles tendinitis most commonly occurs in runners who have suddenly increased the intensity or duration of their runs. It's also common in middle-aged people who play sports, such as tennis or basketball, only on the weekends.

Middle-aged men!

It took two months to get back running again, and I think the spring in my step might have got up and gone for good.



Then, I went to the doctor and next thing you know they are sending me to get an MRI and these two young twenty-something nurses are telling me it's going to be OK and let me tell you, Ned and MRI's are not OK. Somehow I made it. Lots of prayer. And one breath at a time.

Oh, the MRI was for this tumor in my arm that we hope is a shwarmanoma (sp?) or something. Supposedly even though mine is the size of a goose egg shwarmanomas are harmless. They're biopsying it sometime this fall to make sure it is harmless. If it's not, well then we will have a whole lot more to write about concerning this. Harmless or not, it needs to come out. And I'll be writing about it either way. Oh, guess what. Shwarmanomas happen in guys aged 30-50. Middle-age. Go figure.



Then, this week I got laid up with something called an "ileus." I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. Today, I'm just having explosive diarrhea. I've never been more happy to have semi-working intestines.

All this health talk. I really am getting old.

Paul wrote that outwardly he was wasting away, but inwardly he was being renewed every day. That's my new hope. The last few months I've gotten in touch with my humanity. My frailty. Even my mortality. And I'll be honest, it's not easy. It's humiliating to not be able to do things that you used to be able to do. But there is also this new comfort with my limitations that I'm also starting to enjoy.

Happy Birthday

I'm in the middle of the annual running of the fall gauntlet. It's like this every year. I love it as much as I'm always exhausted by it.

It hurts so good. Take my birthday for instance. I warned Lia as it was approaching. We'd just have to fit in the celebration where it fit. We ate cake for breakfast the day before the actual day. We still haven't opened presents. The actual day of my birthday (last Tuesday) I attended some meetings. Got some writing done. Played with the kids. Listened to my parents sing me happy birthday on the phone. Went to Dave Dave's back to school cocktail party. Hung out with my bro, Kyle. Then, played some night ultimate with a bunch of college friends. A perfect Ned-kind-of-day. All these people. All these relationships.

Most didn't know it was my birthday.

I talked to my friend Kyle about the fact I have a hard time having my birthday celebrated. I had this sort of epiphany while talking to him. It's not really being celebrated. I actually like being celebrated. The thing is I like being celebrated for having done something deserving of being celebrated. Birthdays you get celebrated for just the fact you were born. I didn't do anything to deserve that. So why be celebrated for it?

Then, it altogether hit me: that's why birthdays are so awesome. We celebrate folks for just the fact they were born. For who they are, not what they've done…

To be loved that way.

It is the perfect way to be loved.

The fact I have a hard time receiving this kind of love points to something deeper going on inside me. Maybe I think myself unlovely. Maybe I feel like I need to be something more than I am to be of value. Maybe this all translates into how I see my relationship with others, with God.

What if I thought differently? What if I thought that I could be loved just for being Ned? Not that would be something to celebrate…

Toga Olympics

You were made for this…that's what we say at Young Life. It's not really Young Life we're talking about. Not exactly Toga Olympics either. Or jousting with wacky noodles covered with shaving cream. Or singing Enrique Iglesias songs loud and out of key. Not even relationships, though relationships are worth more than gold. 

I mean it, gold is nothing compared to Zeus and Hercules here. I love these guys. 

The honest truth is I was made for this. I'm thirty-eight (for another week), got a wife, two kids, I'm sore when I wake up, my eyes get glassy around 9:30, and I'm wearing a Toga with teams on it like the North Stars and Whalers that don't even exist anymore. And there's nowhere else I'd rather be and nothing else I'd rather be doing. Because it's not Young Life or togas or games or singing - it's life. LIFE - and a host of other words that mean everything to me - like freedom and meaning and love - and most of all and above all and really all there is to it - it's Jesus I was made for. And so were you.

Sneak Peak

Hey Guys, 

Clay is getting close. 

Check out one of Beth's amazing illustrations. 

And below, there is my latest draft of my back cover teaser. Let me know what you think!

Have you ever wondered if there was something more to life? Have you wondered what it was? Or wondered how to get it? Clay has. Wonderings like that curl around his mind like question marks and keep him up at night. That is, they do until the day a boy bumped up the road.

Clay is a story about becoming, of what happens on the journey toward meaning and purpose. What happens to Clay will surprise you, shock you. It may even reshape how you see things, including yourself.

It did for me.

Ned

Stomp Stomp

Dave Dave's first book he can read. Stomp Stomp by Bob Kolar.

Cinderella

Before taking Anna Rose to theater camp, I prayed. It wasn't out loud. I wrote it down actually. It said this, "Please let her have a role."

She was getting one, of course. Everyone in play camp got a role. But what I was praying for was that she wouldn't get a role like Flower #2" or Mouse #11 not that there's anything wrong with being a mouse of any number. It's just I wanted her to be Lilly the Villager. Something like that. Or Whiskers the Cat. It just seemed cooler to me. That's why I prayed it.

So later that day I pick her up from play camp and ask her what role she got. She said, "Cinderella."

CINDERELLA!

That's not the role I was asking for.

"Are you nervous?" I asked. I was nervous.

"No," she said.

Now for those of you not familiar with the Children's Theater of Winston-Salem. At the end of play camp there are two live performances in front of hundreds of paying customers.

"Really?" I asked.



"It's not that big a part. Caroline gets to be a mouse." She says this as if she is big time disappointed.

"But you're Cinderella!"

"I'm just young Cinderella."

"Oh," I said, finally able to breathe.

"I don't even have any lines. I just have to act."

"How do you have to act?" I ask.

"Sad. It's hard actually. I have to bite my tongue to keep from smiling."

"That is hard," I said, biting my tongue.

The Craziest Week Nothing Happened to Me

Aug 8 - texting before Global Leadership Summit

9:24am Ned: Let's get a babysitter and go out to dinner

10:21am Lia: Great! Silo or 6th and vine or willow?

11:15am Lia: Felt a big cyst on my right ovary. Getting ultrasound.

Wait! What?

Lia was at her yearly OB check-up. It was supposed to be a nice, routine visit. The unnecessary kind of visit. When life suddenly turned upside down. The ultrasound looked suspicious. Lia scheduled a meeting with a Gynecological Oncologist for Monday.

Dinner that night was not as light-hearted as originally hoped.

The next three days, which included her birthday, would be awful. Lia explained to me how bad ovarian cancer is. I started freaking out. Earlier that day, my wife was perfectly healthy. Wasn't she? Now, she was dying. But she looks perfectly healthy?

It rained on her birthday. Anna Rose crashed over the handlebars on her bike. We had to eat at home instead of going dancing. Lia, at one point, told me "This is the worst birthday ever." And I'm thinking, what if it's her last? 

I was falling apart and beating myself up because I was. I would like to think that when Lia needs me the most, I would be able to be that strong shoulder for her to lean on. It didn't happen that way. Needless to say, it was not my finest hour. Way to step up, Ned. Mmmm Boy. Have mercy.

Well, we got it. Monday, a nearly two hour oncologist appointment brought us hopeful news. Dr. Skinner didn't think it was cancer though she thought the cyst was not in the ovary but in a more sketchy location. Mmm Boy, Have Mercy.

She scheduled the surgery for Wednesday. Tuesday we took a deep breath. Lia's mom drove down from Columbus. She was a lifesaver. Lia went into surgery Wednesday afternoon and about 5:10pm I received the best news possible. The cyst was in the ovary. It was not cancer. And Lia could go home that night.

I met her in recovery. She wasn't winking. Only one eye worked.



Unfortunately, the anesthesia that made Lia loopy also made her nauseous. For the next two hours, I had to watch the poor girl dry heave. Finally, we got her clothes on and carted her to the car. She slept a long time. And woke up hungry. She hadn't eaten food in 61 hours. Holy smokes.

This weekend we went to the mountains. Did some of her favorite things: hiked Bluff Mountain,
visited an art gallery, drove to a vineyard and enjoyed not only a wine tasting but a private tour. We went dancing that night.

The Rise and Shine Band sang her Happy Birthday. It was like making good all the things that went so bad.



And here I am: Nothing happened to me. Still, I feel like I went through the rinse and spin cycle. And now, happy and grateful as I can be, I'm sleeping for the first time in a week. Mercy.

Happy Anniversary! Sweet Leela.

Thank you all for your prayers and support during this crazy week. 

Wheels

This was a big week for the Erickson family. Dave Dave and Anna Rose, with minimal instruction from their parents, mastered the art of balance. Dave Dave was first. He is still a day or two away from figuring out pedals. I'll post a video when it happens. But he is a natural daredevil on the Strider. Here is a video from Monday. Yesterday he was doing stuff I can't do.

Anna Rose has had her ups and downs with the bike. I've been trying to get her on one for a couple years now only to achieve a lot of yelling and tears. However, it took one look at Dave Dave for everything to change. Nothing like a little sibling rivalry. In less than twenty-four hours, she went from not being able to balance a lick to full fledge biking around the block. Sorry, mom, about the no helmet. 

I gave her a tiny push and off she went. I'll never forget it. Nor will I forget what she said: "Oh my goodness, I can bike!" She sure can…

Here is a bonus video of Anna Rose's last swim meet. Can you say future triathlete?

Rodo

For me, the Beyond adventure didn't really begin until this moment -

the Dragon and Unicorn Farm on the way to Egmont

I can't remember who said we should stop. It wasn't me. Or maybe it was. Like I said, I can't remember. But the next thing I know, the van I'm driving is doing a U-turn and we're heading back to the Dragon and Unicorn Farm. We pull in this tiny gravel driveway and immediately start getting the what-the-heck-are-we-thinkings going up and down our spines; but there's nothing we can do about it, the driveway's tiny.

We arrive at a house. There's no farm to speak of. Two tiny cottages that look big enough to host a family of dwarves or hobbits maybe. No mythical creatures anywhere in sight. Not even dragon or unicorn yard art. Not even a garden gnome! The guys are yelling at me to turn around. I'm trying. But I'm in a van and the driveway is...tiny. It takes twelve points to get me sideways when a lady steps out of the house.

"Can I help you?" she may have added "eh" at the end, I can't remember. We were in Canadia.

I roll down the window. "Uh, well, we saw your sign and we've never seen dragons or unicorns before so we thought we'd stop by."

"Oh, we don't do rodos no more."

Rodos? What's a rodo? I decide to pretend I know what she's talking about. "Aw man, no rodos. Well, I guess we'll go then."

And we get the heck out of dodge.

After we took a picture.

Rodos became the running joke of the week. Whenever we saw something we didn't know what it was, we called it a rodo. Or we would do a rodo. Or eat a rodo. Or we would rodo our kayaks to camp. You get the idea.

So anyway, all you dragon, unicorn, Canadia lovers out there - if you know what a rodo is, tell me...on second thought, don't. I kind of like leaving its definition to my imagination.

Way Beyond

I don't know what this says about me but I feel most at home when I'm not at home, when I'm not in anybody's home, when I'm in the woods or on a mountain or on a rock or somewhere above treeline. When I'm lakeside or seaside or riverside or creekside. When there's wind and when there's not wind. When the sun is reflecting off the water or beating down upon my red hair. When there are animals and bugs and birds and fish. When there's nothing but stillness. And when there's a trail behind me and more before me. Or even if there isn't. Even if there is nothing to follow but a cairn or a compass or ones best read of the line. I love nature. I don't miss the comforts of showers and mirrors. Mirrors are not comfortable. Showers...I like showers. But I don't miss them. I brush my teeth and that feels clean enough.

Happy Ned

I took five guys on a Beyond Malibu trip last week. Will Mitchell, Ethan Carros, Owen Baughan, Spencer Powell and Coleman Johnson took a chance on a week with me in the woods and water of the Pacific Northwest.

Ethan

Will and Owen

Coleman creeping on the Baby Seal

Super Spencer

We were scheduled for a seventy mile sea kayak. I was given the option to change it to the 103 mile hard core version. I didn't tell them until the end that I took the option. To me there was no option.  They can look in their comfortable mirrors now and see a hard core man looking back at them now. They'll thank me for it someday.

Setting Out

Men at Jurassic

It was quite the adventure. Seeing Malibu for the first time. Coming within paddle reach of baby seals. Seeing I don't know how many of their relatives. Spawning salmon ramming our boats. Bald Eagles swooping so close you could hear the wind cutting through their wings. Yes, quite the adventure. Chatterbox Falls. The pristine Princess Louisa Inlet. Then sunrise over Two Bear.

Ethan eyeing Mt. Albert

Baby Seal

Two Bear

Then there was the night with bioluminescent water. That's right. Swimming in the Pacific Ocean with the stars above us and the water shooting off luminescent stars every time we moved our body. I almost missed it. Almost went to bed. It was midnight and I had twenty-four hours of travel starting at 4am. But there was bioluminescence in the water! I got out of bed. I swam and sang and screamed like...well like I do when I'm happy and so full it's coming out whether I want it to or not. There was no one in miles to hear me...except the boys. I woke them up. Sleep could wait. I couldn't let them miss this. It was too wonderful. Too over the top. An amazing week of God and nature and here was nature and God at their finest. What a show!

Yes, God showed himself to us. He met me personally there on the Jarvis Inlet. Walking on the stony beach of Two Bear, I couldn't write down his words fast enough. I won't forget them. He etched them on my heart.

On the way back "home"

Thank you John Guppy, Matthias Newell, Lee Grindstaff, and Kevin Smith for putting up with us. We couldn't have asked for better guides. Hope to make it back your way again soon. Until then, remember there is no place better to be than here...with Love.

Always and Everywhere.

Rodo.

ned

Oonie Koonie Cha!

Three years ago, my daughter attended this Winston-Salem tradition. Camp Oonie Koonie ChaOonie Koonie Cha, run by five Music Care teachers from the area, is on the surface what you might imagine it would be: a music camp. Dull. Boring, right?

Well, I was blown away. This was hands down one of the best camps I'd ever seen. The next year, I ran into one of the ladies and told her so. The long and the short of the conversation led to me being invited to audition for her role (she was retiring after 15 years!). Well, low and behold I got the job.

So for two weeks this summer I was not Ned, not Daddy, but Shnivel the Pirate. Wow! I now have an even greater appreciation for all preschool through second grade teachers. I was whupped. But boy oh boy did I have fun.

Thank you Beth, Amy, Amy, Claire, and Sandy for taking a chance on me. As well as Serah, Josh, Kelsey, and my other partners in crime who made this summer so fun for the kids of Winston-Salem and beyond.

Next year's theme is DINOSAURS. Hope to see you all there! Go to Oonie Koonie Cha to see pictures and learn more.

Ruff Weekend

Poor Winnie had a rough time of it this past weekend. On a walk with Casey and Leela, Winnie took off into the Christmas Trees after what Leela figured to be a bunny only to find Winnie rolling her nose in the grass having been sprayed by a skunk!

Pee-ew is right.

We attempted the old wives remedy of tomato juice. I splurged and got organic though really it wasn't splurging because it was the same price, and actually it was a waste of money because it doesn't work and only made Winnie look like she was bleeding out the head.

Plan two was Hydrogen Peroxide, Baking Soda and Dish Soap. We all braced ourselves when I put the ingredients together thinking that Hydrogen Peroxide might have the same reaction to Baking Soda as Baking Soda has to Vinegar. It doesn't.

We learned a lot of things that night. We didn't exactly have the right quantities of ingredients, which was ok with me since I consider recipes as "suggestions" whereas Leela thinks of them as "rules." But since she wanted nothing to do with our skunky dog, I was free to make any concoction I wanted. I went with the liberal strategy and went heavy on the dish soap - it having the strongest scent.

It worked. I'll leave you with the recipe.

1 Bottle Hydrogen Peroxide.
1/2 Cup of Baking Soda.
And a big squeeze of Smelly Soap.



Winnie's swim in the pond the next morning got most of the suds out.

Unfortunately for her, the poor dog's trials were not over.

For the sake of time, I'll omit the part with the nine kids chasing her around, and I'll leave you with the sad climax. As we were packing up, poor Winnie took a whizz on some clover, yelped and took off running. Turns out dogs can get stung on the fanny. Who knew?

Needless to say, Winnie's little heaven on earth felt a little more like the other direction. It brought a whole new meaning to the old saying: "Every dog has its day."

Happy Birthday Anna Rose

You are the star of my blog and the light of my life. I love you. I love you. I will always love you. I will  love you always, my sweet Anna Rose.